Just after the newspapers announced that Marie Curie had won her second Nobel Prize, this time for chemistry, Madame Jeanne Langevin, the wife of the man with whom Marie was having an affair, released the lovers’ letters. The newspapers focused much of their print on the affair rather than the award. Marie, born in Poland, was castigated by journalist Gustave Tery, who said that France was “in the grip of a bunch of dirty foreigners, who plunder it, soil it, dishonor it.” Certain members of the Nobel committee felt that Marie’s attendance at the award ceremony would create difficulties, and one wrote to her, begging her to stay in France.
Monsieur Paul Langevin, the inventor of SONAR, challenged Gustave Tery to a duel. Face to face, both men lowered their arms. Marie attended the dinner intended to honor her for her work with radium and sat with Sweden’s King Gustav V - who was also accused of an affair with a married man.
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ReplyDeleteRadioactive: A Tale of Love and Fallout by Lauren Redniss
Not what I was expecting, but interesting point made... Is it your point that hypocrisy and infidelity are separate matters?
ReplyDeleteI was fascinated by Marie Curie's life choices and accomplishments. I wonder if a man
ReplyDeletehad won the prize would it have mattered to anyone that he was in the midst of an
affair, especially in Paris. Her accomplisments are so significant and her affair so banal - although
Langevin's wife did not view it that way.
Also, Marie Curie has been elevated to the status of scientific goddess, it's interesting to know that she felt romantic passion - and suffered because of it.